A Short Post (for once)

Just to relate that I've already pretty much written the next post -- but I'm waiting to give the main subject of that post one more chance to respond to a couple very simple questions before I publish it. 
The subject is the former "senior special agent with the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension" who was listed in a newspaper article as a forensic investigator on the case.
About all I asked him was, if or if not his office had received my info regarding the case, and if the forensic evidence they had gathered did or did not match Joseph Couture who was convicted of the murder.
It's just weird that he won't answer.
I suppose there is a tiny chance that this person has not yet read the emails I've sent him, but I would certainly think he MUST have read them -- as he is listed as an instructor in Law Enforcement at a tribal college in Minnesota, is listed with an email address at that college, and I've repeatedly written him for over a month, now.
Anyway, I've sent him a draft copy of the next post to give him another chance to comment before I post it, which I will within a few days.
More news, also: I've received the address of Sandra Couture, and will be writing to her to see what I can find out there. I'm hoping to get the address of Joseph Couture very soon, as well.  As I have to write them through "snail mail" from Thailand and then wait for a response, I don't expect to have much to report there for quite some time. 
Anyway, I'm really curious to hear if the Public Defender's office ever did mention to them that there's a witness who saw size 11 or 12 New Balance shoes on Tom Hinze the week of the murder, and all the rest of the stuff I've written about in all the previous posts.
I'm betting they were never told any of it. I'm just itching to hear the stories of how they were induced to "confess", especially to that ridiculous "arson fire" I discuss in this post and this one. The fire that supposedly happened in Carlton County, but was never reported anywhere until after St. Louis County had already "solved" it by cracking a jail-house code. ("Fishing" meant they were going to burn the house.)
Thanks for reading! 

Ruminations (and Research) on that "Arson Fire" ...

The next event to be related in this history would naturally be the "confession" of Joseph Couture on July 26, 2013. 
I've been wanting to post the media reports of that "confession", and to comment on them and compare them with previous media reports of the Langenbrunner murder.
However, I've been waiting for months for someone in Duluth to get me copies of the original articles from the library. A couple of weeks ago I finally emailed the library website directly, and was answered within a day by a research person there. She very helpfully explained the quite simple and inexpensive procedure to get these articles copied, which I've related to a couple of people in Duluth. I'm hoping they can photograph these copies and send them to me electronically within a few days. They said they would, anyway.
In the meanwhile, I've been ruminating, on several subjects.
Very important, obviously, I eventually want to ascertain -- somehow -- if or if not Joseph and Sandra Couture ever received any news that there is a witness who says they were framed, and who wonders how they were induced to confess to something they didn't do. 
However, it is obviously impossible to hold a private conversation between a prisoner in the U.S. prison system and myself in Thailand. Anything they might say or write could be as easily "induced" as their "confessions" obviously were -- as they are certainly in a totally controlled situation.
I've got a hope back in my mind somewhere that eventually someone else will step in and help me in this matter, some way, some how. But that hasn't happened, yet, so I'm just letting that go, for the time being. 
I've been ruminating on other subjects, as well.
I've reread all of these posts several times. Sometimes I've made minor corrections in grammar, and there are probably still more small errors, if anyone wants to quibble. 
In one early post I noticed I had a date wrong: I had typed "July 7", instead of "July 17", for the date I would email Ron Taggart of the Public Defender's office with a long email "summing up" my testimony. I corrected it ... the July 17 date was directly copied from the email record, so I knew that was correct.
Then, I've also been doing more Google searches, to see if there's anything else I've missed, or perhaps been mistaken about. 
I had very clearly stated (in post 9) that what I called the "very suspicious arson fire" had very strangely not been reported in ANY media ... UNTIL the day that the Sheriff's Department stated that they had already "broken the jailhouse code" of Sandra and Joseph Couture, and arrested Sandra Couture for setting the fire. I will paste the exact words of the article reported in the Carlton County Pine Journal on August 1, 2012.
On July 6, the Carlton County sheriff’s office responded to an arson fire at the property of one of the relatives of a witness who claims Joseph Couture killed Langenbrunner. The house, a car and a truck on the property were burned with the structure being a total loss. Two dogs were reported missing and presumed dead. Details of the arson fire were consistent with details discussed beforehand between the Coutures, the complaint alleges.
On July 19, Carlton County deputies returned to the scene of the arson fire when the property owner reported that a second attempt had been made to burn items on his property. Deputies recovered the remains from several Molotov cocktails — glass bottles with accelerant and fuses in them.

Yesterday, though, I did a new Google search for "arson fire carlton county minnesota july 2012", and when I got to this search result,
 Northland's NewsCenter  News, Weather, Sports _ NBC, CBS, MyNetworkTV, and The CW for Duluth MN _ Superior WI _ Search Results.htm 
I asked that results be listed "by date", rather than "by relevance". I didn't expect to find anything regarding an "arson fire" in July -- as I hadn't found anything in my last search based on "relevance".
I was momentarily startled when I saw this entry (highlighted below, as a screen capture photo):

The above result, please notice, though, is for July 16, and not July 6, the date the "Couture arson fire" supposedly took place. And, as you can see in a screen capture photo directly below, there is no result for anything at all, on July 19, when Sandra supposedly threw the Molotov cocktails at the same address. I guess the Carlton County deputies who responded to the Molotov cocktail assault didn't think this was worth reporting?

Nevertheless, it did say there was indeed a fire, in Cloquet, in July of 2012, even though it was on the 16, instead of on the 6th, as the Couture fire was reported to have occurred, and though it was not an arson fire. 
I continued on in my search to July 6, and found absolutely nothing about any arson fire on that date, either, as below:

But, as I have caught even my own self miss-typing dates, I decided I had better click on the "More" button on the July 16 entry, and read more.  
Here is the link to the article, which also has a video which shows the home and garage. I'll cut and paste the text to the article, which is basically the same thing that is narrated in the video: 

Fire Ravages Cloquet Home

July 16, 2012 Updated Jul 17, 2012 at 10:26 AM CST Cloquet, MN (Northland's NewsCenter) -- A fire ravaged a home in Cloquet Monday afternoon.
The home and the garage are deemed a loss. The home is located on Agate Street in Cloquet.

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No one was home at the time. Two dogs inside the home were rescued by an off-duty firefighter.
Cloquet, Esko, Carlton, and Wrenshall Fire Departments responded to the scene.
The fire has been deemed not suspicious at this time.

 At first, I thought maybe the reported Couture "arson" reported as on July 6 was actually this fire on July 16 -- but please notice that this fire took place in the afternoon of July 16, as reported in the video, "around dinnertime". You can see in the video, it's broad daylight. 
It would be very strange for Sandra Couture to come right out in broad daylight, throw gasoline and charcoal lighter fluid around, and light it on fire, right in view of the neighbors ... and no one would deem it as suspicious? 
Also, please notice that the two dogs in this fire were rescued, and are not "missing and presumed dead", as are the mysterious dogs which left no skeletons behind, in the "Couture arson", of July 6. 
Also, please notice that this fire occurred right in the City of Cloquet, so why would Carlton County Sheriff's deputies be called out of their jurisdiction to investigate this fire, which even the State Fire Marshall didn't view as suspicious?
Also, if you watch the video, please notice the house and garage are not by any means junky, but quite modern, and obviously worth many times more than the $8,600 that Carlton County reported as total damages from all incendiary fires (which includes arson), in 2012. (Also in post 9.)
Obviously, this is not the same fire reported in post 9, and I will repeat once more, with even more conviction than I had before: The "arson fire" to which Sandra Couture plead guilty in April 2013, is verrrry verrrry suspicious. There was NO SUCH fire reported!!!
Well, then I proceeded to continue on in my ruminating, and I found the 2012 Annual Report of the Cloquet Police Department, as a pdf file. I read through it, to see what I could find about any relevant goings-on in Cloquet, during July of 2012. I will paste this as a screenshot of page 14 of the pdf document:

Again, nothing about an arson fire in Cloquet, especially one requiring assistance from Carlton County Sheriff's deputies.
There is this brief mention on page 16 (reproduced below), which I think may be concerning the Langenbrunner case ... though this case is said to be a "14-year-old" cold case, and the Langenbrunner murder was actually 12 years old. 

Then there is also this brief mention, below, listed almost as an afterword on page 20 -- which does specifically refer to the Trina Langenbrunner case:

However, again, we get absolutely no explanation of why this fire was never ever mentioned in any media report, on or even near the day it supposedly occurred. And no explanation of why it is said (above) that Cloquet detectives were in charge, but below, (as I already quoted once, near the top of this post) it says that it was the Carlton County Sheriff who responded: On July 6, the Carlton County sheriff’s office responded to an arson fire at the property of one of the relatives of a witness who claims Joseph Couture killed Langenbrunner. The house, a car and a truck on the property were burned with the structure being a total loss. Two dogs were reported missing and presumed dead. Details of the arson fire were consistent with details discussed beforehand between the Coutures, the complaint alleges.
On July 19, Carlton County deputies returned to the scene of the arson fire when the property owner reported that a second attempt had been made to burn items on his property. Deputies recovered the remains from several Molotov cocktails — glass bottles with accelerant and fuses in them.
Tags: news, crime, courts, cloquet
Whose jurisdiction was this "arson fire" REALLY in? When did this "arson fire" REALLY happen? Why wasn't it reported as an "arson fire"? How can a modern house and garage, plus vehicles, plus magical dogs, plus 6 other incendiary events have a total loss of only $8,600, as reported in official Minnesota fire statistics (below)?

How can all this be? I don't think it can!
Maybe the Sheriff can explain all of this so it makes a little better sense than it does now?
As my Great Aunt Frances Pulaski told me when she was about 100 years old, "Lloyd, we live in hope."
Please stay tuned.

Some DWI Arrest/Court Records

Tom Hinze was released after just a few months in NERCC, in the fall of 2003. He was allowed to leave the State of Minnesota with no probation or reporting requirements. He was also fined $50, plus a $35 "surcharge", plus $2 court costs. Tom had had (and even bragged about having had) multiple DWI offenses, open bottle charges and test refusals, several of the DWIs having been of the class "inimical to public safety".
I personally, along with other people in the area, felt that Tom had really gotten off easy -- especially since people, especially myself, were also pointing towards his probable guilt in the Trina Langenbrunner murder. It didn't quite seem right to let this guy leave the state without at least checking his DNA, first. 
Over the years I've held to my opinion that Tom was given preferential treatment, and that the Sheriff's Department was at the very least remiss in their duty to check out my allegations in the Langenbrunner case. According to Ron Taggart from the Public Defender's office (quoted in a previous post), they had DNA tested a lot of other people ... but not Tom.
Both in January, and in May through August of 2014 I tried my best to get Bob Boone of the Duluth Reader to assist me in publishing my testimony in this case. However, as I've already mentioned, all I got from him was a lot of my time wasted.  Bob Boone never gave me an answer at all, so I finally asked my brother-in-law (who was at the time writing a column for that paper) what Bob had said. My brother-in-law reported to me that Bob had said this:  He said the judicial system is completely separate from the police and he has never seen a conspiracy here between judges and police, or two separate police departments (like Carlton and Duluth).... 
About that time, I laughed out loud. And, since at the time no one would even go to the library and get me the files of newspaper articles that I needed, I decided that I would have to try to do the research myself, from here in Thailand. I found that I could look up the records online myself. 

I have to admit, I don't understand all the codes and acronyms in these arrest records. I naively thought that "GOC", for example, meant "GOOD OLD COP", (referring to the fact that Tom's father was once the Sheriff of Red Lake County in Minnesota, or perhaps "GRANT OF COURT" -- but a friend informed me that actually it stands for "General Offender Code", and he even sent me the codes, as follows: 
GENERAL OFFENSE CODES (GOC)
A ATTEMPT TO COMMIT
B ASSAULT TO COMMIT
C CONSPIRACY TO COMMIT
F FACILITATION OF
N NOT APPLICABLE
S SOLICITATION TO COMMIT
T THREAT TO COMMIT 
X AID AND ABET
Y ACCESSORY BEFORE THE FACT
Z ACCESSORY AFTER THE FACT
Below, then, are screen shots of Tom Hinze's actual arrest records, posted here as jpg files. You readers can try to figure out the codes yourselves. I don't see any of the above codes as fitting in the records as well as my original notions do -- but maybe someone else can inform me.  

I'm going to paste Tom's records first, and then after a space, I will add the records of a Mr. Raymond LeDoux, whose name appeared in the News Tribune for having had multiple DWI offenses. By the way, I don't see a single "GOC" anywhere in Mr. LeDoux's record, though they are quite numerous in Mr. Hinze's.
You can compare and contrast these for yourself. I have to say, I STILL feel strongly that Tom Hinze got preferential treatment, and I STILL feel strongly that the Sheriff should have DNA tested him before convicting someone else on the basis of a "confession" -- with no DNA evidence whatsoever. 
Here is the link to the website where I found the records: http://pa.courts.state.mn.us/default.aspx 
(If you don't believe me, you have to prove you're not a robot by typing in a number, then you can search the site yourself. The records are public.) 
*(These jpg files below can be enlarged by clicking on them. For the largest image, if you're using Firefox, right-click, and then click on "View Image". Other browsers may be a little different. Please notice (1) the first file on Thomas Hinze is like a "table of contents" to the rest of them, and (2) each new case starts with a bold black bar on the top of the file.)*

The above are all the case records I could find of Thomas J. Hinze. Notice that the most severe conviction is for a "gross misdemeanor", though several of these cases above were first charged as "inimical to public safety". Also, please notice that Tom never got anything for driving without a license or insurance, though he had had neither one, for years. 
Below for comparison are the Minnesota records of Raymond LeDoux, who spent a full year in jail for a felony DWI offense, and got his name on the front page of the Duluth News Tribune (something Tom has never yet accomplished!). 
Do you think Mr. LeDoux dares to drive through Minnesota without a license or insurance?

I post these with the caveat that maybe there is something I don't know about these GOC codes, and perhaps someone can tell me how they prove that Tom and Mr. LeDoux WERE treated exactly equally under the law. If so, I will stand corrected on that matter. 
However, to get back to the main point of this blog, I need to see evidence that Tom Hinze was DNA tested in the Trina Langenbrunner murder case, that his DNA did not match the DNA of the murderer, and that Joseph Couture's DNA DID match the DNA of the murderer. I don't think that should be too much to ask.
And that is the end of this post! 
Please stay tuned.

A Very Unique Case of Arson

I will start this post directly with two newspaper articles relating the arrests of Joseph and Sandra Couture, and the confession of Sandra Couture, for a very suspicious "arson fire", (along with my comments in red font). 
The reason I call the fire "suspicious" will become apparent as you read the articles and comments.
The newspaper articles are quoted for educational purposes.   

(Carlton County Pine Journal)

Published August 01, 2012, 12:00 AM
Suspect in Langenbrunner slaying accused of witness tampering
The man accused of murdering Trina Langenbrunner is accused of working with his girlfriend to harass, intimidate and threaten witnesses against him.
The man accused of murdering Trina Langenbrunner is accused of working with his girlfriend to harass, intimidate and threaten witnesses against him.
Both also are suspected of being involved with an arson fire set at the residence of a relative of a witness against him. (Comment from Lloyd Wagner, 5-26-2014: Funny they’d go after a RELATIVE of the witness – and it would be interesting to read elsewhere about this arson fire, as arson fires and even accidental fires are generally reported in the media. I guess this one is “classified”, however. Wouldn’t want the Coutures knowing whose house they’d burned?)
Joseph John Couture Jr., 41, and Sandra Kay Couture, 38, both of Cloquet, are charged in State District Court in Duluth with aiding and abetting aggravated first-degree witness tampering by threatening another to provide false information to police, aiding and abetting first-degree witness tampering, and aiding and abetting third-degree witness tampering.
“Investigators became aware of concerns from some of our witnesses who were contacted,” said St. Louis County prosecutor Jessica Smith. “Investigators began monitoring phone calls between Joe and Sandra from jail. Through that investigation they were able to corroborate the threats and where they were coming from and that led to the charges.” (Comment from Lloyd Wagner, 5-26-2014: According to this, Joe and Sandra ARE fully aware who the witnesses are (and it seems there are more than 2 witnesses, though in the beginning, there were only 2 of them). Obviously, the witnesses’ identities are only being kept secret from the public, as the Coutures already know who they are. I wonder what purpose this serves. Do the witnesses need protection from the public? I suppose those questions will be answered as the case proceeds towards trial (wink wink).)
Joseph Couture was being held in the St. Louis County Jail on $1 million bail on charges of intentional second-degree murder and second-degree criminal sexual conduct in the 2000 death of Langenbrunner, a 33-year-old mother of three. An additional $200,000 was added to his bail.
Langenbrunner was last seen hitchhiking in the area of Brookston Road between 1:30 and 2 a.m. on Sept. 3, 2000. Joseph Couture was a neighbor of Langenbrunner at the time. The victim’s stabbed body was discovered off a rural road in southern St. Louis County.
Couture was arrested on June 15 after two witnesses came forward identifying the Level 3 sex offender as Langenbrunner’s alleged killer, 12 years after the fact.
Sandra Couture is being held in the St. Louis County Jail on $150,000 bail on the witness tampering charges.
According to the criminal complaints charging witness tampering:
Phone calls made by Joseph Couture revealed the control he had over girlfriend Sandra Couture. They spoke in a code in which it is alleged that Joseph had Sandra attempt to intimidate two witnesses to recant their statements. The threats to the victims are alleged to have occurred between July 6 and July 23.
On July 4, Joseph Couture called his girlfriend and allegedly told her, “I need to (expletive) get out and (expletive) kill people.”
On July 6, the Carlton County sheriff’s office responded to an arson fire at the property of one of the relatives of a witness who claims Joseph Couture killed Langenbrunner. The house, a car and a truck on the property were burned with the structure being a total loss. Two dogs were reported missing and presumed dead. Details of the arson fire were consistent with details discussed beforehand between the Coutures, the complaint alleges.
On July 19, Carlton County deputies returned to the scene of the arson fire when the property owner reported that a second attempt had been made to burn items on his property. Deputies recovered the remains from several Molotov cocktails — glass bottles with accelerant and fuses in them.
Tags: news, crime, courts, cloquet

 Below (indented) is the text relating the guilty plea of Sandra Couture, with some comments from me, (in red font). Again, the article is quoted for educational purposes.

Published on April 1st, 2013
Source: Duluth News Tribune “Woman pleads guilty to tampering, arson in 2000 murder case,” March 30, 2013. 
Woman pleads guilty to tampering, arson in 2000 murder case
Sandra Kay Couture testified Friday that she threatened witnesses and set fire to the home of a witness’ family member because her boyfriend, Joseph John Couture, didn’t want them to provide evidence against him in his trial for the murder of Trina Langenbrunner.
Sandra Couture, 40, of Cloquet, pleaded guilty to first-degree aggravated witness tampering and to first-degree arson before Judge Dale Harris in State District Court.
Joseph Couture, 41, is charged with second-degree murder and second-degree criminal sexual conduct in the 2000 death of Langenbrunner. He also is accused of witness tampering. St. Louis County sheriff’s deputies arrested Joseph Couture in June after working the case for nearly a dozen years.
Langenbrunner, a 33-year-old mother of three, was last seen hitchhiking in the area of Brookston Road between 1:30 and 2 a.m. on Sept. 3, 2000. Joseph Couture, now 41, was a neighbor of Langenbrunner at the time. The victim’s stabbed body was discovered off a rural road in southern St. Louis County.
Under the terms of a plea agreement Sandra Couture reached with the St. Louis County Attorney’s Office, she would serve a prison sentence of eight years and eight months for the witness tampering conviction and a seven-year sentence for the arson conviction. The sentences would be served at the same time. Harris directed that an Arrowhead Regional Corrections probation officer investigate Sandra Couture’s background before sentencing on May 13.
The arson and witness tampering case was developed after an investigation by the St. Louis County Sheriff’s Office with the cooperation of the Carlton County Sheriff’s Office and the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension.
Under questioning by St. Louis County prosecutor Jessica Smith, Sandra Couture testified that she had been in a romantic relationship with Joseph Couture but lived in fear of him. She said he was a jealous and controlling man with anger issues.
She said they referred to themselves as husband and wife but were not married. She had been married to his brother.
The fire that Sandra Couture admitted to setting resulted in the destruction of a home and two vehicles and the death of two dogs. She said Joseph Couture wanted her to send a message to those who would testify against him. She said she used charcoal fluid and gasoline to start the fires. She said she didn’t think anyone was home and didn’t know the dogs were present. (Comment from Lloyd Wagner, 5-26-2014: Yeah, she was busily using charcoal fluid and gasoline to burn a house and two vehicles, never reported elsewhere in the media, and the dogs never made their presence known. They must have been soundly sleeping, the whole time. Then according to the Pine Journal article, 10-1-2012, ”On July 19, Carlton County deputies returned to the scene of the arson fire when the property owner reported that a second attempt had been made to burn items on his property. Deputies recovered the remains from several Molotov cocktails — glass bottles with accelerant and fuses in them.” According to the older version of the story, using charcoal fluid and gasoline to burn the unnamed relative’s of the unnamed witness’ house, two vehicles, plus two mute dogs wasn’t enough to sufficiently tamper with that witness, and she later went back to finish the job right, using Molotov cocktails, this time! Evidently there were no charges added for the Molotov cocktails, however.)
The judge asked if she was claiming duress for her role in the crimes. She said she was not.
The couple hatched most of their harassment plans against the witnesses while Sandra visited Joseph at the St. Louis County Jail. They developed a code system to communicate and also held up notes to each other at the jail visiting window. (Comment from Lloyd Wagner, 5-26-2014: They must have been awfully clever in their code system and in hiding their notes held up at the visiting window, because no one at the jail noticed anything amiss until AFTER the house, vehicles, and soundly sleeping dogs were burned, and the Molotov cocktails thrown.)
Sandra Couture also said that Joseph wanted her to find people to help him escape from custody during a trip from the jail to the courthouse. (Comment from Lloyd Wagner, 5-26-2014: I wonder if he told her that in code, or if he held it up in a note at the jail window. Well, it’ll come out as Couture’s case proceeds toward trial, I’m sure (wink wink).
“Witness tampering is taken very seriously, and the County Attorney’s Office will vigorously prosecute those who engage in this crime,” St. Louis County Attorney Mark Rubin said in a prepared statement, “Our system depends on the courageousness of witnesses coming forward to hold people accountable for offenses. They deserve the fullest protection under the law.” (Comment by Lloyd Wagner, 5-26-2014: I’ve already related elsewhere how I personally was treated by their system, when I came forward as a witness in this same case.)

I’d like to point out further, that usually dogs leave skeletons behind after they're burned in a house fire – but these dogs, according to the Sheriff’s and media's accounts, are “missing and presumed dead”. Evidently, they were transported directly to dog heaven.  
I’d also like to point out and emphasize again that there was no account of this “arson fire” in any media, until after the Coutures were blamed for it. Usually, when there is ANY fire, anywhere, arson or otherwise, it’s reported in the news the morning after. This fire, however, wasn’t reported anywhere, until AFTER the Sheriff had “broken the secret code”, figured out who dunnit, and arrested them. Was the fire classified information, or what? Why would the local media not report that a fire had occurred, and where it had occurred?
One more thing I’d like to point out: The State of Minnesota keeps detailed records on fires that occur in the state, including "incendiary fires", a class that includes ALL fires started by humans, whether by accident, or by arson.
There is a pdf. file which can be found on Google, called “Fire in Minnesota, 2012 - Minnesota Department of Public Safety”, and on page 25 of that publication, I quote the total damage for ALL incendiary fire incidents in Carlton County in 2012 =
7 total incidents, with a total damage of $8,600. 
(Snagit image of the applicable part of that page is below.) 

Awfully strange, it seems to me, that this supposed Couture arson fire, which was never reported in the media, and which supposedly burned a house plus 2 vehicles, plus two dogs which disappeared into thin air, plus the damage from 6 OTHER incendiary events, totaled only $8,600.
That must have been a pretty junky house, eh? I’d like to see a picture of it, but we can’t have a picture of it, of course, because if that address were released to the public, that might let the Coutures know whose house they had burned, and put that witness in danger.  Evidently, the Coutures didn't know whose house they were burning, they just talked "in code" about burning some house, and Sandra just hit on the witness' relatives house by sheer luck. That's why the Sheriff has to keep the identity of the house secret!! All of this might make perfect sense to a rather stupid 6th grader who's watched too much TV, I suppose ...
There are many other anomalies in this case, which I will get to as soon as I can.
Please stay tuned.